Customer Reviews

Eastman and Laird's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Volume one

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I can't tell if the other "pop-up" review is an excellent joke, or a stupid mistake. In either case, do a little googling on Kevin Eastman's Bodycount and you'll find that the only things "popping out" in this book are bad guys' eyeballs and babe's bazungas... aka NOT for kids 3 - 6.

The book is a completely different take on the turtles, presented in a hyper-violent, hyper-sexualized style. The art is impressive and is certainly worth the read for a turtle vet who wants to appreciate the full spectrum of the TMNT, from goof to gore (this being of the gore variety). It will certainly wash the candy-coated-cowabunga-cartoon-turtle-taste out of your mouth if anything... plus it's turtle founding father Kevin Eastman's swan-song (or rather swan-rampage) to the TMNT - his last main turtle work before he signed over all the rights to collaborator Peter Laird.

I received this and read it in one sitting the same day. If you are looking to buy TMNT stuff for your little kids, do NOT buy this. However, if you are looking for some ultra violent, abstract Frank Miller worship, BUY THIS NOW. If you have always wanted to see TMNT in an adult oriented story, BUY THIS NOW(you get to see Raphael shoot an Uzi at some thugs).

I truly felt like I was reading a Frank Miller book from the 80s. Some of the reviews say things about the art being inconsistent, but that didn't bother me too much, I get what they are doing. Raphael is my favorite and seeing him and Casey basically just kick @$$ for 100 pages is awesome.

The book itself is magazine size like the Heavy Metal mags, which is cool, but the binding seems kind of fragile, I could feel the glue coming apart as I was turning pages. I only noticed one word misspelled and there was one page that is in there twice. All those points aside, I would say it is worth the price.

I'm sorry I spent money on this. I'm probably going to send it back for a refund. What's wrong with it you ask?

1. Poor construction. After one reading and only opening the book at about a 100 degree angle, the spine is coming apart. I'm pretty sure if try and read through it again, the cover is going to fall off.
2. Duplicated Pages. Page 41 is duplicated on Page 35. Whatever is supposed to be on Page 35 is nowhere to be found in the book.
3. Inconsistent print quality. Throughout most of the book the artwork is pretty crisp but on pages 44-51 the printing changes and everything looks smudged or blurred. Like someone took the original hi-res art, lowered the DPI by quite a bit, then ran it through a filter to soften all the jagged edges.
4. Inconsistent artwork. Most of the artwork itself is great, but in some sections it looks like someone's less talented cousin tried to copy the original artist's style but got it wrong. Examples are pages 74-75.

The story itself is ok, so if you want it for that, great, but just be prepared for the book to fall apart after more than a couple readings, and try to ignore the issues the printing and art.

Image did a fantastic job with the turtles for the brief time they had them, taking the book to some dark places. The continuing story though out the run is the search for splinter, though along the way we get to see some of out favorite heroes mutilated in ways that force the team dynamics to change. I hope someone eventually releases the rest of the run so we can get to the point where raphael dons the shredder armor and takes over the foot clan.

I have enjoyed Eastman and Laird's TMNT in the past. It is written for a mature audience in contrast to the Archie Comic's version and the children's cartoons.

However, half the duo is apparently not enough. Sans Laird, this book is horrible.

The artwork is done by Bisley who often does work for Heavy Metal Magazine and his style is well-known. However this is not one of his better works. Frequently the turtles go from one panel to another and have three fingers and then four or even five fingers...same with toes. Counting fingers and toes is basic art, and messing up something so basic is just sloppy. The artwork simply fails for this and other reasons (such as the mistaken lighting and shadowing and other basic things, which kids learn in grade school art class).

At the end of this novel is a write-up by Eastman explaining how the point of this story was solely to have the longest running comic book gun fight and to have the most eye-balls fly out of skulls. Well, that was accomplished, but at the cost of any coherent storyline, meaningful plot, depth, etc.

The pages are even out of order, and certain panels are repeated. This is easily the cheapest quality and most poorly written graphic novel I have ever read.

After reading this, I not only wish I had my money back, but I wish I had my time back too.

How this ever got published is a mystery to me.

Buy this book only if you are one of those people that have to have every appearance of the TMNT. Unfortunately I am one of those people and am pretty disapointed with this book.

A previous reviewer mentioned duplicate pages and while that is true...the action is so poorly presented I almost didn't notice. But as a TMNT fan who bought this product as a completist I was most disapointed that Casey Jones and Raphael are afterthoughts that are only bit players. Almost like they are in the way of the story that Eastman wanted to tell. I guess to his credit the story in this form is simply called "Bodycount."

Don't buy this unless you cumpulsively have no choice to.

First thing I noticed when I opened Heavy Metal's reprint of TMNT Bodycount was the sound of the spine of the book cracking as the cheap glue holding it together started falling apart. This thing is not well made. On top of that my copy had page 38 reprinted on page 36. I was completely confused as to what was happening in the story until I noticed the error. The story is ultra-violent, over-exaggerated, gun-porn, starring one of the turtles and Casey Jones and really isn't all that great anyway. I could have lived with that if not for the crappy quality of the physical book itself.

Book is best suited for kids 3 1/2-6 yrs old (old enough to know who TMNT are, young enough to get a kick out of pulling the tabs on the pop up pages). A little confusing as it obviously is summarizing a longer more complex story --heavy on action/movement, because it is a pop up book.